Blackbird Fly Read Free

isn’t even Chinese,” said Gretchen.
    â€œIt doesn’t matter.” Jake crossed his arms. “It’s all Asian people, not just Chinese. They all eat dogs.”
    â€œWhy?” Alyssa asked.
    Jake shrugged. “I don’t know. Ask Banana here.”
    Braden and Lance chuckled.
    My whole body felt hot, like I’d suddenly developed a life-threatening fever.
    Alyssa raised her eyebrows at me. “Apple, is this true? Do Chinese people eat dogs for dinner?”
    â€œI’m not Chinese,” I said.
    Alyssa rolled her eyes as if to say, We know, we know, but close enough.
    â€œShe may not be Chinese, but I guarantee you don’t wanna go to her house and ask her mom for hot dogs,” Jake said. He put his fingers on the corners of his eyes and pulled them to make slits. “Would you-ah like-ah Chinese-tea with-ah you-ah hot-dahg?”
    Braden covered his mouth with his fist in a fakeattempt to hide his laughter. Lance clapped his hands and leaned forward, saying, “That’s so wrong, man,” between his own laughing howls.
    Jake looked directly at me and said, “There’s more than one reason you wound up on the Dog Log.”
    Everything stopped. The laughter. My heart. Time. It was like Jake had thrown a grenade at all of us—a grenade that hit only me.
    Alyssa’s jaw dropped. She looked back and forth between me and Jake.
    I prayed for a giant earthquake to crack open the ground and pull me down, deep into the earth. I wanted to bolt and run and hide forever.
    â€œApple’s on the Dog Log?” asked Alyssa.
    A swell rose from deep inside my chest.
    Jake shrugged.
    Gretchen looked at her hands.
    Even Braden and Lance weren’t saying anything.
    â€œWhat number is she?” asked Alyssa.
    â€œI don’t know,” mumbled Jake.
    A few seconds passed—seconds that felt like a thousand lifetimes—before Gretchen finally broke the silence.
    â€œIs anyone else coming over, Alyssa?” she asked.
    â€œYeah, is anyone else coming?” said Braden. He turned to Alyssa and pulled his cap down low. It cast a shadow on his face, hiding his pockmarks.
    Lance stood up and walked to the cooler on the other end of the patio. “Yeah, Braden,” he said. “Your mom.”
    Braden stole Lance’s seat and smiled like he’d just won a victory. We all watched Lance walk back, waiting for the confrontation we knew was coming. Everyone was smiling—everyone but me. I pressed my lips together tight. It seemed like everyone had moved on from the Dog Log, except for Alyssa, who turned away every time I looked at her.
    When he got back with his soda, Lance glared down at his seat and said, “Get up.”
    Braden smirked. “Make me.”
    Lance set down his soda and wrestled with Braden until the legs of the chair scraped against the concrete. Gretchen squealed and jumped up as they shoved their way in her direction.
    â€œI told you to get out of my seat!” said Lance, his face red and laughing. He had Braden in a headlock.
    Braden struggled. His cap fell off, exposing a hat-head of sandy-brown hair. He flailed his arms. “Don’t make me sit next to the dog-eater!” he hollered.
    Jake thought it was so hysterical, he almost fell out of his chair. I wanted to stand up and tell all of them about what he’d been like on that bus ride—how he looked at me with big, scared eyes after he’d gotten sick and how I had to find his cell phone in his backpack, the one his mom gave him for emergencies, and how I walked to the front of the bus to tell the teacher what happened. I wanted to tell them that I whispered it to her so he wouldn’t be embarrassed and that I stood a certain way in the aisle so the other kids wouldn’t see the mess he’d made.
    â€œSit next to her—she might eat your little pup!” Jake hollered.
    Alyssa looked straight at me, so I smiled and tried to